Who Am I?

I served in the US Navy from 2002-08; four of those years were as a Nuclear Propulsion Operator aboard an aircraft carrier. I engage in political activism in various Democratic circles when I am able to. I have a cat, and I am an uncle.

All opinions that I express are my own and do not reflect the views of any organization that I represent.

Tuesday, February 16, 2016

ANTONIN SCALIA (1936-2016)

Sometime
between when he went to bed on Friday night and the discovery on Saturday,
Supreme Court Justice Antonin
Scalia died suddenly in his sleep due to natural causes while on vacation
to the Cibolo Creek Ranch in Shafter, TX. Scalia was 79 and the longest serving
Supreme Court justice in US history. He is survived by his wife Maureen
McCarthy, 9 children, and 36 grandchildren.

Scalia
was born in Trenton, NJ, graduated summa
cum laude from Georgetown University in 1957 and later magna cum laude from Harvard Law in 1960. He followed it up with
seven years in private practice followed by five years teaching at the
University of Virginia School of Law. In 1971, President Richard Nixon
appointed him as the General Counsel for the Office of Telecommunications
Policy where he formulated the federal policy for the once nascent cable
television industry. In 1974, Nixon nominated him as Assistant Attorney General
for the Office of Legal Counsel. The nomination was confirmed by the Senate nearly
two weeks after Nixon resigned and Gerald Ford was sworn in.

Within
the new Ford administration, Scalia lobbied for the president to veto a bill amending
the Freedom of Information Act as part of the Government
in the Sunshine Act of 1976. President Ford obliged, but Congress had
enough votes to overturn the veto.

Scalia
would return to Washington, DC in 1982 when President Ronald Reagan would
appoint him to the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia. Four years
later, Reagan would appoint Scalia to the Supreme Court due to the retirement
of Warren Burger as Chief Justice and the elevation of William Rehnquist to
that position. Scalia was confirmed to the Supreme Court by a 98-0 vote.

Scalia
was known for promoting Constitutional originalism, meaning the exact language
of the Constitution is exactly that. At Southern
Methodist University in January 2013, Scalia was quoted as saying the
Constitution is “not a living document” and is “dead, dead, dead.”

Well…
so is Scalia.

There
are many cases that Scalia has authored siding in the majority and in dissent but
here are some of the most consequential opinions that Scalia was known for.

In Planned Parenthood v. Casey
(1992), a 5-4 decision with 3 concurring majority opinions, Scalia wrote that,
“(t)he States may, if they wish, permit abortion on demand, but the
Constitution does not require them to do so. The permissibility of abortion,
and the limitations upon it, are to be resolved like most important questions
in our democracy: by citizens trying to persuade one another and then voting.”
While the decision upheld most of the Roe decision, it scaled back that
decision. On the occasions that abortion has appeared at the Supreme Court,
Scalia has tried to use it as an opportunity to overturn Roe as what was seen
with the Texas anti-abortion HB-2 law that was to be heard before the court.

Speaking
of Scalia’s view of originalism, if the high court had adopted that view it
certainly would not have overturned segregation with the Brown ruling
and the fight for marriage equality would have certainly grinded to a halt with
trying to overturn same-sex marriage bans at the ballot box in conservative
states thus wasting more time and energy needed.

Scalia
vehemently opposed the idea of affirmative action and was likely to cast a vote
to scale back, or at worst overturn it, using racial demographics in determine
college acceptance in Fisher
v. University of Texas. During oral arguments, Scalia said
that “(t)here are those who contend that it does not benefit African-Americans
to get them into the University of Texas, where they do not do well, as opposed
to having them go to a less-advanced school, a slower-track school where they
do well,” and “(o)ne of the briefs pointed out that most of the black
scientists in this country don't come from schools like the University of
Texas. They come from lesser schools where they do not feel that they're being
pushed ahead in classes that are too fast for them.”

Last
summer was a remarkable year for the Supreme Court having heard arguments for
the second legal challenge to ObamaCare
and marriage equality. In
the second ObamaCare challenge, the court ruled 6-3 that President Barack Obama’s
healthcare law remained constitutional and if the opposition was interested in
repeal, they should do so through the appropriate channels instead of the
judicial branch. In his dissent, Scalia used terms like “pure
applesauce”, “SCOTUScare”, and – my personal favorite – “jiggery-pokery.”

Last
summer Scalia was a part of one of four dissents in Obergefell and used it as a
matter to rail against so-called “judicial activism.” That in itself is ironic
because I can think of three times the court has engaged in “judicial activism.”

In Shelby County v. Holder (2013),
the decision that invalidated portions of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, Scalia
called the landmark legislation a “perpetuation of racial entitlement” after
noting that subsequent congresses had reauthorized and amended the legislation
several times over with little to no opposition. That statement received gasps
in the Supreme Court’s chamber.

The
decision allowed many states to go ahead with voter ID laws that disproportionately
impact low income, college students, and voters of color – key voting groups
that tend to vote Democrat. In 2012 a Pennsylvania State
Legislator admitted what the true goal of passing voter ID was: to allow
Republican nominee Mitt Romney to win his state (which no Republican has won Pennsylvania
since 1988 and Obama won that state and the election TWICE). In a Daily
Show segment in 2013, a North Carolina Republican precinct chair also admitted
the truth as well: to kick the Democrats in the butt.

“Judicial
activism” is why we have the current campaign system in place. Citizens United v. FEC (2010)
and McCutcheon v. FEC (2014)
gutted the McCain-Feingold campaign finance reform law and anything that attempts
to reign in moneyed interests. Citizens United is considered to be the source of
the trouble and gave rise to the current Super PAC era in American politics.
Senator Bernie Sanders (VT, I) has made overturning Citizens United a key piece of his campaign platform for the
Democratic nomination. Both Citizens
United and McCutcheon were 5-4
decisions. Both decisions were authored by Chief Justice John Roberts with
Justices Kennedy, Alito, Thomas, and Scalia joining.

But
the most egregious example of “judicial activism” was when the Supreme Court
intervened in the Florida recount process for the 2000 presidential election. Scalia
and four other Republican appointed judges – Rehnquist, O’Connor, Kennedy, and Thomas
– ruled in a controversial
5-4 decision to halt the Florida recount efforts. In his Obergefell
dissent, Scalia wrote this:

“I
join The Chief Justice’s opinion in full. I write separately to call attention
to this Court’s threat to American democracy.”

And:

“It
is of overwhelming importance, however, who it is that rules me. Today’s decree
says that my Ruler, and the Ruler of 320 million Americans coast-to-coast, is a
majority of the nine lawyers on the Supreme Court.”

I
guess Scalia had no problem with interfering in Florida’s efforts to conduct
their recount efforts or invalidating the nearly 51 million that cast a ballot
for then-Vice President Al Gore and making 5-4 the only result that matters
from that election.

The
only thing I mourn over with the passing of Antonin Scalia is his wife, his
children, and his grandchildren. I assume he was a decent husband, father, and
grandfather in comparison to how he treated our country.

Though both
clubs are rather exclusive, the Supreme Court is probably more exclusive due to
the high court’s hidden nature. We see the president in the public view while
the Supreme Court has balked at allowing cameras in the courtroom for oral
arguments.

One
thing for certain, the death of Antonin Scalia is likely the end of an era of
conservative dominance on the Supreme Court.